An artist's initial broad stroke is always most impactful, and obsessively adding layer upon layer of paint to fill in details often diminishes the painting's aura. When an aura is lost, it is impossible to get back.
Ryuichi SakamotoRead
In the old days, people shared music; they didn't care who made it. A song would be owned by a village, and anyone could sing it, change the words, whatever. That is how humans treated music until the late 19th century. Now, with the Internet, we are going back to having tribal attitudes towards music.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects a shift in the ownership and sharing of music from communal to individualism and back.
Ryuichi Sakamoto highlights the transformation in the way music is perceived and shared throughout history. In earlier times, music was a collective experience, owned and enjoyed by the community, fostering a sense of togetherness and creativity. With the advent of modern copyright and individual ownership, music became commodified, distancing it from its communal roots. However, the rise of the Internet is enabling a revival of those communal, tribal attitudes, where music can again be shared freely and morph with the contributions of many, enhancing its collective spirit.
Themes
MusicCommunityOwnershipSharingTribalCultureInternet
In practice
Example use cases
In a presentation on the evolution of music sharing, this quote can emphasize the communal aspects of music.
More from Ryuichi Sakamoto
All quotes →The majority of the people think that noise is not music. I want to accept noise and even errors and glitches. I enjoy them.
Ryuichi SakamotoRead
I'm just delighted to be living, to be able to have a simple conversation, to feel a ray of sunlight on my skin and listen to the breeze move through the leaves of a tree.
Ryuichi SakamotoRead
Conceptually, I am open to mistakes - errors, actually. I do play lots of wrong notes while I am making some music, and a mistake or a wrong note is like a gift for me: 'Oh, wow, an unknown sound or an unknown harmony. I didn't know about this.'
Ryuichi SakamotoRead
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